General Topics/Tech Tips Discussion on break in periods, rider comfort, seats and pad suggestions. Tech tips as they become available will be posted here.

Brakes

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Old 05-19-2019, 06:40 AM
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Default Brakes

I’m riding a 2015 Freewheeler trike with 23,000 kms (14,300 miles) on it. I’m a very easy rider when it comes to using my brakes, don’t ride crazy fast, gear down coming to stop, etc... My dealer says I need new brakes, front and back, considering how I ride, I’m thinking I should be getting more mileage than this before needing new brakes or is this “normal “?
 
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Old 05-19-2019, 06:53 AM
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A few MM difference huh?

They'll sell you at a bit over where you'd replace them.

They sell em for $.

You change em for your priceless life.

Sorce
 
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Old 05-19-2019, 07:14 AM
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Did you eyeball them yourself? How much pad is left?
 
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Old 05-19-2019, 07:47 AM
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Mileage has nothing to do with brake wear. I could cover 100 miles of straight road one day, and never touch the brakes. Do the same 100 miles the next day on a different route, and brake dozens of times. Which day was normal?
 
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Old 05-19-2019, 08:21 AM
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sometimes, we think we ride easy but truth told, hummm???
brakes depend upon sweep area, rotor material, pad material (must be compatible) and weight. front brake will tend to wear faster due to loading change when braking. however, 15,000 miles would not be a bad number for stock setup.
now you can swap things up but each will have +/-'s.
harley does not use a audible pad warning system. what they do is loss of stroke, seems riders will notice this more so that a squeal as many people will ignore anyway. so if your leaver/pedal is just about bottomed out, two options:
replace the pads and check rotors (DO NOT TURN, THESE WERE SURFACED GROUND)
do as i do, IF, you will keep up with it, if you are not ONE with the machine, do not even think about it. i ride aggressive so when i have loss of stroke, i have made shims to shim out the pads to get extra life from the pads. even when i have loss of stroke, pad material is nowhere at its EOL. so i shim out and next loss of stroke, i install new pads. the shims will gain around .025 material so a total of .050 due to shims behind both side and this restores full stroke. there is still material left.
side note: you must know your brake setup as things will change model to model, examine the pad material and measure it to see if the above is feasible. if you have "X" thickness new and you used "Y" material and have "Z" material left and you have more than the minimum thickness after subtracting "Z" from "Y" then doable.
cheaper to do your own brakes, easy enough.
 
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Old 05-19-2019, 08:24 AM
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Brake pads are simple to change, but then again I have no experience with three wheels. Genuine HD pads cost more but work well.
 
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